The Pelican Institute’s Steve Beatty reports that the federal government just filed a new $548,000 lien against ACORN for unpaid payroll taxes. This comes at the same time as Louisiana Attorney General Buddy Caldwell investigates the group for unpaid state payroll taxes.
According to Beatty, his adds to the existing tax debt of more than $1 million.
Why are all Democrats tax cheats? They keep voting for higher and higher taxes for their productive neighbors to pay for social programs and grants, but they don’t want to pay into the system themselves. We are talking about people who have nothing but contempt for the law here.
A great debate on whether atheists can make any sense of morality without God grounding objective moral standards. This one should be very good for atheists to listen to.
This is part two of last week’s discussion about the RichardDawkins.net atheist who converted. Listen to that part first if you want.
I feel a bit bad about this because it is clear that one factor that works to convert people to Christianity is that Christians can exhibit self-sacrificial love to others and atheists are basically at the mercy of their own selfishness. They just cannot behave morally when it goes against their self-interest, and that is SAD. Anyway, I felt badly because I began to worry about whether I have been as loving as possible while explaining Christianity to others.
On a related topic, I think Christians can also distinguish themselves from atheists and other religions in the way that men and women relate romantically. In Christianity, there is the tradition of chivalry, courtship and romantic love. The Christian Bible requires that husbands love their wives to the point of dying for them. This is lacking Islamic cultures, and not required in Hindu cultures.
But this lack of romantic love is also a problem in the feminist West, where women eschew chastity, marriage and children. Instead, women here have empowered the state to act as a replacement for husbands/fathers. The more that the state does for women, the less a really good man can distinguish himself and make himself useful. Men don’t like to share responsibilities with the state.
I’m now scheduled to participate in two debates to be held next Spring:
1) with Richard Carrier on Jesus’ resurrection; Feb 11 @ Washburn University in Topeka, KS
2) with Stephen Patterson of the Jesus Seminar on Jesus’ resurrection; Wednesday, March 31 @ 6:00 pm, at FSU in Tallahassee, FL
UPDATE: Mike Licona replied to an e-mail I sent him with this:
My debate with Carrier will differ somewhat from Bill’s. Richard and I have agreed to a different format that we hope will bring greater audience enjoyment and help us to stay on a few important matters longer. After each of us give 15-minute opening statements, we’ll engage in 6 period of questioning (10-minutes each). Each of us will have 3 periods. We’ll then have 5-minute closing statements then open up for audience Q&A.
I thought that Carrier beat Licona narrowly in their first debate. My friends thought it was a draw. But William Lane Craig crushed Carrier soundly in their debate. It will be interesting to see if Licona can do better against Carrier the second time around. Carrier has extreme positions typical of the village atheists in the “Internet Infidels” camp. If Licona could get Carrier to defend his weird ideas, then he will win the debate. I would place Carrier somewhere to the left of hard-core skeptics like Robert Funk or Burton Mack.
Audio from the first debate between Richard Carrier and Michael Licona is here at Apologetics 315.
Audio of the William Lane Craig vs. Richard Carrier debate is here at Apologetics 315. Carrier’s admission of defeat is here, on his blog. Craig’s post-debate responses to Carrier is here and here.
Licona’s first debate with Ehrman, (audio, video), which Licona won easily.I enjoyed this debate a lot.
William Lane Craig’s debate with Ehrman, (video), which Craig won easily. This was also a fun debate.
WINTERY KNIGHT 